I have kids that are under the weather – so we have been stuck at home the last few days. As soon as one hit nap time and the other was otherwise occupied, I sat down for some ‘me time’ at the craft table with my sponges. I find it so satisfying to ink up sponges and start blending. Every creation is slightly different, but that’s what makes it fun.

This one also tied nicely into a design challenge I have only just discovered over at Daring Cardmakers. Their challenge this week was blended backgrounds so I was excited to enter it. The card itself took under an hour to put together (getting around to blogging it took another day or so – such is life I guess!).

I was inspired to make this card after looking at lots of similar ones on Pinterest – sunset scenes complete with various types of birds seems pretty common, but still I love making them.

I masked the horizon with a post-it note, and used a 2.5″ circle for the setting sun. The sky was created using the following colours, all slowly built up.

• Daffodil Delight
• Peekaboo Peach
• Pumpkin Pie
• Flirty Flamingo
• Real Red
• Sweet Sugarplum

For the foreground – which is supposed to be kind of beachy / wetlands, I firstly went over the bottom part very lightly in Tempting Turquoise. I made it slightly darker around the very bottom using Pacific Point. I then – with soft hands – used all of the above listed colours (except sweet sugarplum) to create a merging point between sky and water.

All of the stamps, except for the flowers in the bottom right, were from the set called High Tide from Stampin’ Up. The flowers came from the retired Stampin Up set called Silhouette Sentiments.

For the reflection of the walking birds, I tried to use the technique where you stamp on acetate and then press the acetate into the card – but I failed miserably! I kept smudging the ink on the acetate. So instead I used my aqua painter and basic black ink and just scribbled under the birds to make it look a bit like a reflection.

I really liked how this card ended up – It was my tiny piece of serenity in my otherwise chaotic day.